Shelby Cass’s Weblog

Dad got a new truck.  This is awesome for so many reasons.  Selfishly I think it is awesome because he could come visit me today (we’ve been visiting him since his last truck went kerpoot since he’s been driving a huge rental moving truck which sucks for gas mileage and parking ANYWHERE).  We got to chatting as we do, and he mentioned his new truck seat was giving him some trouble in the low back area.  He mused out loud that I may be able to do something in the way of help, but then wrote that thought off immediately.  But I heard him…and the brain wheels were a spinnin’.  Okay not spinnin’.  Clicking slowly?  Did I mention he came over so we could go to brunch?  This was pre-food and only one coffee into the day.

We walk down to his truck…new used truck…no bells or whistles which fits Dad just fine, but no seat adjustments either, which made me have to use my brain even more.  I was thinking I’d have fun with levers and knobs, but instead I was left with one 6’4″ body and one truck seat moved all the way back with 6’4″ body knees coming slightly above hips.  Now, if you’ve ever listened to my ergo spout (the thing below my nose), you know that one of the first things you must do when sitting down is to make sure your knees are at or slightly below your hips.  I looked at my poor dad’s lumbar spine which was being pulled forward by his pelvis (which was being pulled forward by his hamstrings) and knew what I had to do.

I quickly walked to my toolbox (aka my car) and pulled 2 seat wedges out of my trunk.  My friend Duncan had purchsed them online and they didn’t do the trick he needed so he’d given them to me guessing I would run into someone in need of them sooner than he would.  Smart Duncan.  I threw one seat wedge on (Dad hesitated and thought maybe it was more hassle than it was worth), but as soon as he sat down, he sighed “OH.  I think this might work.”

*joy*

I’m never one to assume my first pass was the right/only one, so we drove to breakfast (about 15 minutes), and when we took a turn he sighed again.  “Yeah.  This works.”  Evidently, turns were a big aggravator.  So I am so happy.  I helped my dad and he said “Turns out you DO know what you’re talking about (sometimes)”.  Yeah baby.  Yeah.

I know you missed them.

http://web.me.com/cidstrom/Sleep_Apnea_Surgery/Day_1.html

It’s been 2 years and 2 months since my surgery.  Absolutely amazing.  Just looking back at these pictures it’s extraordinary where I was and where I am now.  I feel like I got the gift of life…  I’m not a different person.  I’m still the same old Shelby.  But I think I am the better non-sick version and that is something I didn’t even know was going to happen going into this.  I just thought I wouldn’t look like Gonzo at night anymore.

As I write this I am at my sister’s house in Dublin (no, not Ireland) taking care of her two kids for a week…more than a week actually.  I moved in on Thursday afternoon (it’s Wednesday night right now), they left Friday night, and will be home (from Belize) this coming Saturday night after midnight.  In a million years I could not have imagined taking care of a 3 1/2 year old and a 15 month old for a week+ on my own…I couldn’t imagine having kids of my own would be really all that possible with how crappy my immune system was and how tired I was even on my best day.

Now, I’m not signing up for the baby wagon just yet.  I think my clock is unplugged or on mute, and that’s just fine.  I mean, after all, I just started sleeping.  Why would I voluntarily give that benefit away so soon?  I hear it takes a long time to make up sleep debt…and I have a lot of it.  Sweet, sweet sleep.  I owe, I owe, so off to sleep I go!  However, big drawback to finding out what a good night’s rest REALLY is?  Take any of that away and I am a GRUMPMEISTER!  Steer clear of the modern-day sleep-deprived Shelby.  Now she KNOWS it could be better…and you will PAY! 

Sleep well!

smac

Geemaneeze!

Boy killed on chair

The world, it ain’t safe.

Thing-A-Day Day 6 I’m really liking this project simply because it makes me loosen up on my heavy self-critique.  No time for that!  Of course, I still do some…but it’s nice to start finish and let something go in a very small period of time.  I think that I have always looked too far ahead.  Regarding most things.  I think of something I want to do, then I think of everything I have to do to get to the end, and I am tired already!  Now, it’s almost as if I cut out the envisioning stage…I mean, I envision the thing in my mind…thing being anyTHING that I want to do but now don’t take as much time doing it once in my mind, just act.  It’s quite liberating.

In case you don’t want to look at the thing-a-day site, here’s what I made today:

Padparadash Swarovski Drops - the hard part was making the other side!

Yesterday was kind of rough since I had to go to Honda AGAIN…  This little click clack bang bang sound in my car when I started it and hit the accelerator…that was very annoying and not very little even though I said that first.  I have been to Honday 4+ times in the past 12 months and spent altogether too much money on my Nick (Nick got his name because within 24 hours of getting him, I had nicked the back bumper putting Jeannie’s new bike in and then gotten a rogue rock ding on the windshield on Wolfe Grade which is still there).  So when I went in yesterday for the blinking oil light and the very annoying rattle, I was PISSED.  And I was as much of a heartless bitch as I could muster…which means not much.  But I did manage to say this: “When I came in the last 3 times there were valid problems that were addressed, but the rattle never went away, so I don’t think I should have to pay a diagnosis fee for something I paid you to diagnose 3 times prior. “  Whew!  I felt so mean saying that!

So the guys were afraid of me and my wrath (NOT) and said they’d try to figure out the rattle in the morning (I told them it was worst in the am when the car was cold) but also noted that in the past year I had not gotten an oil change (!!).  I guess I’d been to the shop so many times, in my brain I thought there was oil changing and basic maintenance happening…  So I got a call this morning: definitely oil and filter change needed, and they found what they are presuming to be the cause of my knock knock who the bleep is there rattle.  Here it is:

I got a rock

Really?  A rock?  Here’s a pic for size reference:

THIS?!?

I am taking bets.  Who thinks this was the problem all year…under or on top of my heat shield.  They replace my exhaust manifold and an oxygen sensor…where exactly is my heat shield?  I’ll let you know if the clacking is gone tomorrow morning.  Keep in mind: There was a definite rattle for exactly 1 second on my way home from the rock-ectomy.  Well, at least I got my oil changed.

OH!  Did I mention: I was going to check my own oil when the light started flashing…Reached down, pulled lever and:

I think it's not good when this is sitting on your passenger seat

Not good.

They wanted $200 to restring the cable since you can’t just glue this back on…when he told me that on the phone I busted an F-bomb and he cracked up.  He apologized for laughing but said it was unexpected.  He showed me how to use pliers and pull the cable without the lever…yeah me.  Have pliers will travel.

On my way home from the shop, some dude in a truck honked at me and said “I can fix those dents on your car” and I was in a well populated area that I knew so I pulled over in the Wells Fargo Parking lot and let him look at the dentage on poor Nick that I refuse to get fixed because each dent “incident” is considered COLLISION and therefore would raise my rates and cost $250 deductable EACH minimum (if Allstate was nice it would be $250, otherwise it would be comprehensive and $500 deductable each).  I think that’s how it goes.  In any case, I had 2 major dents on the passenger side of Nick from parking lot FAILS.  None of them mine directly…indirectly my fault because I had the stupidity to park my car.

The first one happened in a school parking lot while I was chapperoning a Great America event for Jeannie when Nick was still a baby.  The second one happened when I pulled into a spot and some old jerk in a huge SUV backed out of the spot to my right with his wheels curved to the right and kept going even as Nick crumpled with a sound similar to crushing a can until he (the jerk) couldn’t move any more.  Then had the nerve to look at my car and say it wasn’t that bad and look at his and there was no damage so we should be ok…I was speechless.  I got his name and # on a post it…and lost it.   And a certain boyfriend of mine has been disappointed in me ever since…  Long story…but you’re used to that aren’t you?

The dude in the truck (the truck was labeled something like Dent Doctor) said he’d fix both big dents on the spot for $300.  I really don’t want to know if I got ripped off.  I just know it didn’t cost me $500-$1000 and I didn’t want a perfect looking door (since I park at Yahoo! where the spaces are so small even motorcycles have to worry about getting dinged) because I would only be hugely depressed the next time I parked at work and got another ding.  So I did it.  And there’s turtle wax on it right now so I can’t see HOW lovely Nick is minus dents, but when he’s clean, I’ll look and be happy.  So there.

I’m ready to conquer February!  How’s that?  I was in LA talking to my friend Cindy who told me about this project called Thing-A-Day.  You make something every day of February and post it to their blog.  I finished my first project just before midnight on the 1st and spent a little too much time trying to photograph it…but here it is:
My Day 1

I’m pretty excited about it, so I hope you don’t mind…I just might post here too with whatever I decide to create.

For now though…off to sleep…starting Feb off with bad sleep hygeine is probably wrong.

night night

I just got home from a week in LA…which all happened because the Southern California Animation Guild flew me down to talk at their membership meeting.  What did I talk about you ask?  Ergonomics of course.  Kevin, the head of the guild, had read a couple columns I had written for AnimationMentor.com, had contacted me over a year ago to come give a talk, but I had to cancel my trip last year due to the slightly urgent tonsillectomy and soft palate reconstruction.  I just read the meeting notes and I thought they were pretty good, so I am posting them to you.

http://animationguildblog.blogspot.com/2009/01/no-pain-no-pain.html

Ringing in 2009 at a big fat whopping 158 pounds, I am far from my goal of 135, but definitely working on it.  I start with this line because it’s a lot of what I think about.  Since the last surgery I have been doing wonderfully, except recently I have been sleeping over 12 hours a night and dark circles are making a comeback under my eyes.  It’s worrysome, and today on our way home from Novato (where we had lunch with my old friend Brad – Hi Brad!) I started nodding behind the wheel.  After 12 hours of sleep, a taco salad and 2 cups of coffee, that shouldn’t happen…so I am scared and sad…And have been on a 1200 calorie low carb diet since December 15 with only 4 pounds off to show for it (I know you’re supposed to lose it slow to keep it off, but I would still like to wake up with curves in the right places…overnight weight loss would be fine by me!).  Grr.  Depresso entry.  Sorry.  We also picked up badminton again after my sprained ankle, and as soon as my freaking hammer squished finger heals, I will get back into yoga and light weights.

Here’s something awesome: When I was in ballet, oh so many years ago, I had a best friend at SFB.  Her name was Britta.  I called her Brit-Brit.  She called me Shelb-Shelb.  She lived in Daly City, so her family let me stay with them whenever I could (mostly summers and Nutcracker season, but many Fridays as well since we always had class on Saturday).  Britta and I lost touch when I left the school to go to high school (the ballet school told me I had to consider “home schooling” going into the next level which I thought meant I was going to be dumb and not go to college so I chose school), but her mom always remembered me and tracked me down right before Britta got married about 5 years ago.  I was invited to be a surprise guest…I was SO EXCITED.  So excited that even though the day of her wedding was the same day I was released from the hospital with kidney stones still partying in my urinary tract, I wanted to go.  David and Courtland had to very sternly tell me I was INSANE and sat with me while I tearfully called the hotel and left a message for Britta’s mom that I would not be attending.

Fast forward 5 years and I still had not seen Britta.  She and her husband lived in the Caribbean and until two years ago we hadn’t even spoken on the phone.  When we finally spoke on the phone, they had just moved back to Daly City and I was just about to have my MMA.  We again lost touch until December 7 when Britta was going through her mom’s address book looking for people to invite to her mom’s surprise birthday party and found my number.  I was invited to the party and 3 days later got to see the whole family again.  It was awesome.  Amazing.  Britta looked the same and we just picked up where we left off…it was just NICE.  So comfortable and nice.  AND Britta has a goal.  She wants to lose some weight and take a ballet class.  It’s funny how people can travel through life, taking different paths here and there, changing little bits about themselves, yet still be, for lack of a better vocabulary, the same.  You know what I mean.  Not the same person…a richer person who knows more and has been through lilfe-shaping things…but a person who even today, if we met brand new, might still end up being a good friend.  Those ones are hard to find.  And you can bet your bottom that she and I will reach our goals and start taking a ballet class from Zoltan (another story) together.  (By the way, Britta has a cat she named Shelby – teehee *big grin*)

So this year has been great.  I know lots of stuff has happened, but everything has had a positive outcome…as in, I believe I am better off today than I was one year ago…and I aim to keep that trend going.  Tonight Nicholas is coming over and we will very mellow-ly watch tons of Psych and if we’re up at 12 we will all three pour bubbly stuff into glasses, clink them together and wish each other a very Happy New Year.  Which it will be.  I have creed.

Happy New Year to you ALL!

xoxo

Shelby

Holy cow and a half!  Okay it’s been a while.  Since I last wrote I have gained weight (ankle fail), hired a professional organizer (consequently got a horrible upper respiratory cold due to *cough* dust *cough* – but kept on breathing), took a mini vacay to Half Moon Bay with step mom Anne, was spontaneously invited and spontaneously accepted trip to Hawaii for a week before Thanksgiving, had two Thanksgiving dinners (=more weight most likely), skipped out on the NECE in Vegas going on right now (National Ergonomics Conference and Exposition), and put Mochi kitty on a diet.  I’m sure there are more things that happened, but those are the highlights…now let us look at the breathing part of those highlights.  Did you notice?  If ANYTHING was going to test the efficacy of the last roto-rootering of my throat, it was that cold.  Dr. Li for the win!  Party on Wayne!

Oh.  I also had a birthday.  12th Annual 24th.  I had my party at Caprino’s down the street.  There were over 40 people in attendance and I had an absolute ball.  I even hooked up with a cake gal and got myself (in addition to a wonderful raved-about opera cake) a special Shelby cake.

I have now spent about an hour trying to upload photos.  Mood = bad.  Need heat (thought I turned it on–evidently not enough) and food.  TBC.  Sorry!

Left you hanging…as usual.  It’s not that I didn’t think of you all the time, but as time went on, more and more things were added to my mental list of “things to blog” and of course that resulted in overwhelming myself into silence.  Well, I’m sure you are all used to that by now.  So where were we?

Last we spoke I was on my way to the MMA “Reunion”…which is not right.  Reunion implies we had met before.  So…it was the MMA (Maxillo Mandibular Advancement, not Mixed Martial Arts) gathering.  And it was rad.  Met all sorts of cool people and put faces to names of other cool people.  All in all a wonderful day and someday I will post pictures.  Isn’t it enough I’m writing? 

The day after that, my frog died.  Slider, aka Sticky-E (his street name) passed away and I was sad sad sad.  I was so sad and upset that my squeamish better half offered to remove Sticky-E’s remains so that I wouldn’t have to.  Pretty serious.  And I know…it’s just a frog.  But I liked him.  No frogs legs jokes here (believe me I’ve heard them all).  That night I cleaned the terrarium and every morning since then I have walked out of my bedroom and felt a very big THUMP of guilt when I see the empty cage.  Yes…GUILT.  I think I killed him.  I mean, my only job was to keep him alive and I only managed to do that for 5 years.  These guys are supposed to live on average 10.  I am not a model frog owner.  He was sometimes hungry.  His cage was not cleaned as frequently as it should have been.  He did always have water…but you know, I could have done better.  I guess I also could have done worse.  But that was the end, I think, of my frog-owning days.  Now I am cats and gecko mom.

Synopsis of lately things: sprained my ankle last Friday.  Lovely.  But AWESOME NEWS:  It is healing like a CHARM!!!  I sprained my ankle 5 years ago when I was mis-diagnosed with narcolepsy and it took 8 MONTHS in a walking cast to heal.  Same ankle, same inversion sprain…and I’m thrilled with the progress.  Of course no badminton for a while, and yoga is on hold (I see the fat cells rallying) but ever since my MMA surgery I heal faster and on top of that, actually don’t get hurt/sick as much at all.  A credit to oxygen and sleep.  Hooray!  I’m a fan.

Bad news (and maybe someone of doctor knowledge can help here):  My nausea and vomiting is back.  I notice now a very metallic taste in the back of my throat which I figured was post nasal drip or something, but I’ve had PND my whole life and never been a puking machine like I am now.  It’s very attractive, yes, but sometimes I want to be able to turn that whole projectile thing off.  You know?  I think I have something wrong with my stomach.  Maybe from too many NSAIDs which I cannot take anymore except in emergency and only if I am not going to lie down anytime soon.  So I am sitting here with a metallic taste in the back of my mouth and nausea though not so bad, and any moment I will mosey into the bathroom (I pretend it’s on MY terms), pull my hair back into a ponytail (eeww we know why) and get up close and personal with my newly repaired (thanks manager Dan!) porcelain pal.  Not happy, Bob.

On other notes: drinksapp.com go go go!  My car has cost me $2700 this year.  Sudoku is still addictive especially on the DS.  My birthday is on Friday.  I will be 24 again (12th annual).

Happy Saturday night!  I hope you have an awesome weekend and that you spend absolutely NONE of it unnecessarily communing with your commode.

My title is probably not funny unless you’re Cynthia.

This morning (Monday) I went to see Dr. Li, my favorite doctor in the world.  He looked in my throat and pronounced me stitch free.  I wondered why I still had sore throats after talking and he explained that while the stitches were in my throat was reacting to the foreign material and only now after the stitches are gone can the tissue fully heal.

I had emailed Dr. Li over the weekend and mentioned that my chin still hurt.  I found this out on Friday when I leaned on my chin…or did I lean on my hand?  I propped myself up with my hand on my chin?  Oh you know what I’m saying.  And I felt pain…only on the right side…where the screw that broke lives.  So Dr. Li prodded that area and shook his head…I’m sure he wishes at times that I just wasn’t so darned sensitive.  I said it was fine.  Something I would live with I’m sure.  And he said give it some time and we’ll revisit it.  But then…THEN…he said “Keep in touch.  Email me in a month. I don’t need to see you.”  Yowzah!!!  I mean, I know I will have a follow up sleep study at some point, but I guess it’s true.  He doesn’t need to see me again.  *tear*  Now what am I going to blog about?